Canasta Rules — How to Play and Keep Score

Overview

Canasta came out of Montevideo in the late 1940s and became the card craze of 1950s America. Two decks plus four jokers make one 108-card pack, four players sit as two partnerships, and each side builds melds of seven matching cards. A completed seven is a canasta and pays far more than the cards inside it, so the game is a race to finish piles rather than to collect points card by card. One net figure goes on the sheet per side per hand, so a rounds grid with a running total is all the app needs.

Setup

Use two decks and four jokers for two to four players, three decks and six jokers for five or six. Four players form fixed partnerships sitting opposite each other; with two or three it is every player for themselves. Deal eleven cards each, or thirteen in the two-handed game. Turn one card face up to start the discard pile; if it is a wild card or a red three, cover it and the pile begins frozen. Any red three dealt to you goes straight on the table and you draw a replacement.

How to play

On your turn, draw the top card of the stock or take the entire discard pile, then meld if you can, then discard one card. You may only take the pile if you can use its top card at once: when the pile is frozen you need a matching natural pair in hand, otherwise matching an existing meld is enough.

Melds are three or more cards of the same rank. Jokers and twos are wild and may join a meld, but never more than three of them and never more wilds than naturals. Black threes can only be melded as your final play, and discarding one stops the next player taking the pile. A meld of seven is a canasta: natural if it holds no wild card, mixed if it does. A side must finish a canasta before anyone on that side may go out.

Scoring

Each side gets one net number per hand:

• Card points for every card melded: joker 50, ace 20, two 20, king down to eight 10, seven down to four 5, black three 5.
• Plus 500 for each natural canasta and 300 for each mixed canasta.
• Plus 100 for going out, or 200 instead if going out concealed, meaning the whole hand was laid down in a single turn including a canasta, with nothing melded earlier in the deal.
• Plus 100 for each red three on the table, but if one side holds all four each is worth 200, giving 800. If a side never melded at all, its red threes count the same amount against it.
• Minus the card value of every card still held, using the same table. A red three still in hand costs 100.

Card points count whether or not a meld reached seven; the bonuses sit on top. A hand can end negative.

The first meld a side makes in a hand must reach a minimum in card points set by that side's running total: below zero needs 15, from 0 to 1495 needs 50, from 1500 to 2995 needs 90, and 3000 or more needs 120. Bonuses and red threes do not count toward it.

Ending the game

Deal again until one side is at 5000 or more when a hand finishes. That side wins, or if both cross at once, the higher total does.

Common variations

Some groups play to 2500 or 3000, or 10000 for a long evening. A popular house rule fixes the minimum meld at 120 all game. Others require two canastas before going out, or drop the concealed bonus.